Tales From Six Feet Under Movie Review

A teenage boy finds his dad's Ouija board in the basement. An aspiring filmmaker attempts to make a one-man horror movie. A girl swaps text messages with a mystery man on her birthday. It's not a spoiler to say that they all meet a horrible end – the first time we meet any of them is as headstones, with The Visitor (writer and director Nicholas Michael Jacobs) paying his respects over their graves.

Like Jacobs' previous work, Tales From Six Feet Under is as indie as indie cinema gets. However, unlike Night (his dour, unpleasant but ambitious kidnapping movie) this one isn't afraid to get silly. As the title suggests, it's inspired in part by Tales From the Crypt-esque portmanteaus of the past. Jacobs doesn't have the budget to get crazy, but he does do very well with what he has to hand, and keeps the stories so short that none of it outstays its welcome. The whole thing clocks in at a meagre 45 minutes, making for easy, bite-sized viewing.

The acting, as one might expect from such super-indie filmmaking, is generally amateurish, not helped by the faintly ridiculous writing. People speak and text in a manner people rarely do in real life (there's a pretty egregious grammatical error in a government alert), and all of the stories bar one end in the same manner. Still, it's worth it for the mid segment alone, in which a young filmmaker brainstorms ideas for his one-man horror film, jumping from giallo slasher flick to demonic puppet story. Not all of the laughs accrued here are intentional, but they're not all at the film's expense either. Jacobs shows a good handle on tone, and his ideas sparkle with wit.

As low-rent horror films go, Tales From Six Feet Under is easier to watch than most. It looks crisp and clean – presented entirely in black and white – and it's even pretty funny at times. This will do little to win over those who need some sheen with their scares, but this is a cut above most films of its bracket. It'd be intriguing to see what Jacobs could do with a real budget.

There are certainly worse ways to kill 45 minutes of one's time.